Free Software

The next generation of

software development

OR

A new level of

consumer freedom?

What is “free software”?

• Richard Stallman, MIT 1983

• Political Philosophy -‘Free speech’, not ‘free beer’

• Opposite of proprietary software

• GNU

What is GNU?

• GNU’s not Unix…..

• Copyleft vs. copyright

• GNU Emacs, GNU HURD

• GPL/GLPL

• Free Software Foundation (1985)

• GNU/Linux

Free Software vs. Open Source

• Political Philosophy• Ethical Rights• Allows unconditional

‘sharing’ and collaboration

• Only GNU/FSF meet standards

• Development Technique• Better Software• Allows software to

‘evolve’• Sun, Apple, Netscape

all on board.

Free software in the market

• Linux and freeBSD

• Apple, Sun, Netscape

• Microsoft - Halloween Documents (1998)

• LibraNet petition & UDI- hardware vendors

• Id software - quakelives.com

Cases to watch

• Sun vs. Microsoft (servers)

• GNU/Linux vs. Microsoft (desktop)

OS/FS vs. Proprietary

• SoftEvolution - best survive

• Debugging is parallelizable

• $$ from tech support and customizations

• Fast revisions and bug fixes

• Protect trade secrets

• ‘Professional’ coders produce best quality

• Need enforced standards

• Company is liable

Ethical Issues

• UCITA - should software have a license?

• Software liability

• Source code requirements

• Copyright in the digital domain

Is the copyright applicable to the digital age?

"The sole interest of the United States and the primary object in conferring the [copyright] monopoly lie in the general benefits derived by the public from the labors of authors.”

Supreme Court

Fox Film Corp. v. Doyal

Sources

• www.gnu.org

• www.opensource.org

• www.freebsd.org

• www.unix-vs-nt.org

• www.libranet.com/petition.html